Field
This invention relates to nuclear fusion reactors and more particularly to pressure wave generation in nuclear fusion reactors.
Description of Related Art
Nuclear fusion reactions involve bringing together atomic nuclei against their mutual electrostatic repulsion and fusing them together to make heavier nuclei, while at the same time releasing energy. Isotopes of light elements (i.e., elements having a relatively small number of protons) are the easiest to fuse, because the electrostatic repulsion between the nuclei of light elements is smaller than that of heavier elements. The use of light elements may produce significantly reduced collateral radioactivity than comparable fission reactors, which typically use isotopes of heavier elements.
Inducing nuclear fusion reactions is difficult, because of the energies required to accelerate the nuclei to speeds fast enough to overcome their mutual electrostatic repulsion and because the nuclei are so small that the chance that two passing nuclei will interact with one another in a manner which results in fusion of the nuclei is small.
Fusion reactors typically require input energy to initiate fusion reactions. The amount of input energy required is largely determined by the need to accelerate the nuclear reactants to thermonuclear speed and to confine the nuclear reactants in a space that allows them to interact. A reactor that consumes less energy than it produces is said to produce net energy. Such a reactor will have an efficiency ratio (the ratio of energy output to the energy input) greater that unity. The energy output of a fusion reactor is largely determined by the number of fusion reactions that are induced in the reactor and the amount of energy that is released and captured.
There remains a need for methods and apparatus that facilitate improvements to the efficiency of nuclear fusion reactors.